


All Those Fairytales

by Alley_Skywalker



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Pining, implied marius/courf, mentions of eponine/marius
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-13
Packaged: 2019-06-05 01:27:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15159389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alley_Skywalker/pseuds/Alley_Skywalker
Summary: Eponine develops an irresistible attraction to Cosette.





	All Those Fairytales

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Anthusiasm (HalfwayDecentFanfiction)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalfwayDecentFanfiction/gifts).



The first time Eponine sees her is when the girl comes with her father to their dirty grim room. She and Azelma had delivered one of their father’s letters to the old gentlemen and he comes to see them and brings his daughter. She is a beautiful ray of sunlight in the darkness that has consumed Eponine’s life, more so than ever at that moment as the boy, Marius, who used to live next door, has just moved back in with an _intimate_ friend of his, and Eponine is patently heartbroken. She has never quite felt that way about a boy, about anyone. But even that had been a dark state for Marius had hardly noticed her, even in passing. There had always been someone else in his heart.

The girl who comes with the old, white-haired gentleman moves with the grace of a person who knows only comfort and gentleness. She is stunningly sweet, especially in that coldness of Eponine’s father’s lair. That is how she thinks of it – her father’s lair. It does not truly feel like home.

She does not know just then the beautiful blonde girl’s name. Eponine does not recognize her. She is too full of her own cynical thoughts.

All she knows is that the girl is beautiful and completely out of place in her life, and that they probably despise each other.

***

Left to her own devises after her parents are arrested, Eponine has both more and less time to allow her thoughts to wonder. They keep returning to the blonde girl she saw and the more she tries to recall the lines of her face, the more familiar they seem.

But she knows the silliness of it. She is hungry too often and the mind has a quality of dreaming up feverish things in such a state.

***

Eponine finds her, almost by chance, sees her through the grating of the gate, among the leafy greenery of the garden, like some enchanted princess in a castle.

It makes her think of the fairytales in the books her mother gave her as a child.

None of those stories were true, and this one likely wouldn’t be either.

***

Eponine thinks that she must be gravely ill to be like this – watching the blonde girl’s house and knowing the odd details of her life. Knowing, sweeter yet, when her father goes away and she is alone. 

She sneaks into the garden by night, light as a cat over the garden gate, hiding in the bushes to watch the enchanted princess wonder that garden bathed in moonlight. She finds herself entranced as though in a dream. This is, perhaps, the only beautiful thing in her life and the only time in the day when something warm spills inside of her and makes her forget that fairytales aren’t real, and princesses are the reason that others are poor, desperate, cold and alone.

The girl makes her forget and remember at the same time.

***

There used to be a blonde little girl with a face that could almost be pretty if it wasn’t so thin in Eponine’s life. She hardly remembers anything about it – she had been very young. But it had been, years before, when there was still warmth and happiness and comfort. She remembers but in flashes: that she and Azelma had been told that the girl was useless, that she was bad; that she had not paid much attention to the girl; that she only noticed when the girl was gone, and that a sudden, inexplicable sadness had penetrated her. She remembers the girl’s face, though not in detail.

And the more she watches her enchanted princess, the more she thinks of that little girl, whose name, Eponine just barely remembers, was Cosette.

***

Epinine faces down her father with a rancor she did not think possible in herself. As alone as she is, she is not so desperate to not recognize that her father cares very little for her or her sister or anyone. He had only ever been out for himself and now he has come to take the one pure thing Eponine has. Even if it is not really hers.

“I’ll scream, I will!” she says so loudly it is not unlikely she has already alerted someone to their presence.

“You will regret this girl.”

She isn’t really afraid of them. If they kill her, well that will be the end of it and good riddance. She does not think her life is worth very much at this point. Her pretty, enchanted princess is far better suited to live under the sun than Eponine ever was.

Her father and his cronies back off, hissing like so many snakes. Eponine leans back against the cold metal of the garden gate and breathes in the cool night air.

“I saw what you did.”

Eponine jumps at the sound of a soft female voice behind her. She turns to see her enchanted princess standing there in the dark, her hair frizzled and her eyes wide. She looks a little bit less like a princess in that moment, a lot more like a frightened child. 

“I came out to see what the commotion was, though I was rather afraid, but I did not realize when I came out…and I hid just frozen here and saw the entire thing.” She smiles uncertainly. “Thank you. You are very brave, Mademoiselle—oh, I’m sorry. I do not know your name.”

“Eponine.”

“Eponine.” She says it as though tasting the name, as though remembering something. “I’m Cosette.”

 _Cosette_. The face of the little girl from her childhood floats up in front of Eponine’s eyes and she is suddenly flooded with the kind of shame she had not felt in a long time. And a bitterness, and an anger at the world. And yet…an odd happiness.

Because the princess has a name and it’s the name of an ordinary girl who had once been as desperate and alone as Eponine is now.

And it is almost like the fairytales are real again.

***

Eponine runs into the darkness, because hope is so foreign that she is afraid of it.

Behind her, she can hear Cosette shouting her name.

***

The bakery always smells like heaven and today is one of those days when Eponine even has sous to spend. She always enjoys that moment of anticipation, walking into the bakery and smelling the fresh bread and knowing that soon she will be able to taste it. She loathes herself and her life for being like this, but it is a moment of pleasure nonetheless. 

She has had far fewer of those since running from Cosette. But she could not imagine going back. Especially since Cosette will likely also remember her and not want to see her. They had been only children, but Eponine had had everything then and had not been as magnanimous as to share. At the very least, Cosette would surely not want a reminder of those days. 

Eponine walks into the bakery just as the sun sets and just as she approaches the counter, the girl who had just purchased her basket-full of pastries turns around and nearly runs into Eponine. 

"Oh, pardon me! I—”

They both freeze upon recognizing each other. Eponine's heart begins to race and she can feel her face flush embarrassingly hot. She wants to run again but it's harder in the twilight and she seems to be frozen on the spot, like a dog that has run out before an oncoming carriage. 

Cosette looks over her shoulder, as though afraid someone had noticed their strange meeting, as those afraid of being observed for some reason. "Please, come tonight," she whispers hurriedly before slipping out of the shop. 

***

Eponine resolves to not go. 

She goes anyway.

***

“Why did you run that night?”

Eponine has climbed the garden gate like she would before, in the dark of night. She now sits on the bench side-by-side with Cosette under a large, leafy tree. She allows the question to sink in and penetrate her before answering. “I don’t know—No, I do. I was scared.”

“Of what?”

She shrugs. “That you would not wish to see me again. I had seen you here before, in the garden, wondering around in moonlight==”

“Oh—”

“And I liked to just come and look…It seemed you were a dream. It’s nonsense, all this.”

“No, no. But—why would I not wish to—?”

“Because of before. …Do you not remember?” Eponine does not hope. And she would not want Cosette to not remember, because it would only leave this shadow hanging over her. 

Cosette looks down at her folded hands and fingers the delicate muslin of her dress. “Only a little. At first I did not but the more I thought about it…” She bites her lip and Eponine finds herself mirroring the gesture. “I could not stop thinking about you. How brave you were and how you just…ran away. But I remember so little—almost nothing. Just some things here and there. You and I were not friends as children.”

Eponine laughs bitterly. “I’m sorry.”

Cosette continues to pick at her sleeve. “It’s no use to dwell on things so long ago, that we have so little recollection of, when we were so helpless. And…” Cosette looks up. “I would like you to stay. I would like to tell my father what you did, how you saved me—”

“No!”

“Why not?”

“It’s better not.”

Cosette thinks about this. Thinks about how her father indeed does not like her to interact with the outside world too much. He might not approve of this. Eponine seems to read all these things on Cosette’s face. 

“But I would like to stay. If it pleases you.”

Cosette smiles and reaches out to hold her hand. “It pleases me.”

***

Kissing Cosette in the moonlight does not make the fairytales from her childhood real. But it does make Eponine like reality a little better. 

Or a lot.


End file.
